Conventionally, zoom lenses of the two group or the three group type having leading negative lens groups (a configuration in which negative lens groups are provided toward the object side) are well known as zoom lenses to be provided in compact digital cameras, compact video cameras, and portable terminal devices. The rear focus method, in which the weight of lenses can be decreased compared to the front focus method, is often employed as the focusing method of such zoom lenses.
Several focusing methods have also been proposed, in which only a portion of a plurality of lens groups or only a single lens is moved to perform focusing operations instead of moving the entirety of rearward lens groups, in order to accelerate focusing operations and to reduce the weight of lenses to be moved for focusing operations. The zoom lenses disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-279232, U.S. Pat. No. 6,124,987, U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,337, U.S. Pat. No. 6,968,128, U.S. Pat. No. 6,654,180, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-025373, and U.S. Pat. No. 7,576,924, for example, employ such focusing methods. In these zoom lenses, second lens groups are constituted by an object side partial group and an image side partial group. The zoom lens disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-279232 performs focusing operations by sieving the object side partial group, and the zoom lenses disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,124,587, U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,337, U.S. Pat. No. 6,968,128, U.S. Pat. No. 6,654,180, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-025373, and U.S. Pat. No. 7,576,924 perform focusing operations by moving the image side partial groups.